


Whatever You Became (Is A Reflection of What You've Already Done)

by Aurora Cee (SC182)



Series: Hit and Hustle [3]
Category: Fast and the Furious Series, Knockaround Guys (2001)
Genre: Alternate Origin Story, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Prostitution, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, M/M, Modern Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-15
Packaged: 2018-06-02 08:07:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6558793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SC182/pseuds/Aurora%20Cee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before you get wherever you're going, it's good to reflect on how exactly you got there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Whatever You Became (Is A Reflection of What You've Already Done)

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Property of Universal, Justin Lin and Gary S. Thompson. I'm just borrowing them for a moment.
> 
> A/N: Remember this fic: Knock Down, Drag Out This is a prequel. The story of how Brian came to be this Brian.Spoilers for Fast and The Furious, 2 Fast 2 Furious, and Knockaround Guys. Remember this is an AU of all 3 films.

  
He and Taylor didn’t have sprawling conversations, just questions asked here and there. After they left the city, there were only future more or less assumptions about what came next, like the fact that Matty and Taylor would be staying as far away as possible from anyone connected or the hope that Brian’s tricking days were over.  
  
During the days when Taylor was laid up, Brian stayed with him, kept him company. They’d stare at each other. He cleaned Taylor’s wound and changed the bandages. Brian marveled at Taylor’s pain threshold. A few days removed from being shot in the shoulder and Taylor barely flinched when Brian’s fingers skirted the swollen crimson entry site.  
  
Taylor was by no means down for the count. Even with one hand, the way Taylor slid his hand into Brian’s hair and pulled their faces closer made Brian think about Pretty Woman for a fleeting second, but Taylor’s grip was naturally too rough to keep someone like Julia Roberts around. The feeling of his calloused fingertips twisting at the base of Brian’s curls was just right for Brian.  
  
Taylor was like a concrete and diamond-edged Prince Charming with thunder in his voice. Boston was for Taylor. Brian would tell the truth; he didn’t really care for Boston. The difference between Boston and New York was that one was way more Irish than the other, which should make him feel at home. Paul Revere and the Tea Party held little interest for him. It was be colder than New York, but Brian had been places that were far worse. If Taylor ever asked, he might tell him.  


* * *

  
His life was a division of before and after. Before equated to Arizona and Barstow.  
  
Where would he start in describing just how fucked up his life became? There was no specific fork in the road that lead to him beginning his line of work.  
  
If he were to be a tour guide to the sad story of his origins, one would stop and stare, as if one were on a tour of the Hollywood stars’ homes.  
  
It began when his father died. Killed in the line of duty one cold night out in the desert. His dad’s partner, Uncle Tim, came to tell them the news along with a Chaplain. Brian remembered his mother collapsing by the Christmas tree, the stack of presents broke her fall.  
  
The night after the funeral, he was kept awake by the sound of his mother’s crying. He tried to help, tried to calm her, but she simply took him into her arms and cried while stroking the top of his curls.  
  
Eventually, she got better. They got better, too. But every so often he could hear his mother cry herself to sleep. It was a sound that haunted him and broke his heart every time he heard it. After a while, Brian became angry—pissed off that his Dad left him, though he knew his dad had no choice. Rome’s house became his refuge, because he was the only one who knew how bad it was for Brian.  
  
Brian’s mother was a nurse. She worked the later afternoon/night shift. So Brian became a normal presence at the Pearce house at dinnertime. Sometimes he slept over, too. And then there were other times when Rome just followed him home and they watched cartoons and talked about cars until they passed out. His mom always checked on him when they did.  
  
His anger with his parents burned cold, while his love of cars grew hot. So freaking hot that he and Rome decided to boost one. They were thirteen and it was by far the coolest thing either of them had ever done. They didn’t even get caught. So that was what they did from the end of thirteen to the start of fifteen, steal cars—only to return them; sometimes, they just moved them. Then, others like the first time that landed them in juvie, they weren’t as smart as they thought they were nor were they as careful as they could have been. Because they’d been caught red-handed, crowbar and straightened hanger in hand, because two scrappy looking teenage boys mooning over a car that was so expensive most people didn’t know it existed was suspicious for any cop to give them a hard time. Of course, they were taken to the police station to wait for their mothers.  
  
Brian had to stay there the whole night, because Mrs. Pearce was not his mother and she couldn’t sign him out. That was a long scary night, another reason for him to be angry. So, when his mother did come to pick him up, she looked so tired, and he felt bad. Really bad.  
  
He promised not to do it again simply because he’d never noticed how grey her hair was at her temples and how much darker the rings under her eyes had become. He cut her some slack and she did the same. So he went to school, tried to do his homework, and just be the vision of the All-American boy. Hell, Rome even tried for a while too and Mrs. Pearce couldn’t have been more proud.  
  
That lasted until he was sixteen going on seventeen. They’d gone to school, stayed out of as much trouble as possible, but it had always come back to cars and racing. This wasn’t the kind of racing his father would want Brian to do, but it was the only kind either Brian or Rome could afford.  
  
Then, a cherry red Corvette was just too much to pass up. The car had seemed to come on to them like a siren, like a drug begging to be taken. It was the best night of their lives until the red and blue flashing lights of a cop car were on their back bumper and the panic of being in a stolen car set in.  
  
No slack was to be found this time. The judge decided to be tough on them, because as she saw it, this was only the tip of the iceberg into a life of crime. The fall of the gavel resonated like the ringing of a death bell. It was a sound one never forgot. When it was quiet, even in the future, miles and miles away from his little hole in the wall of a hometown, Brian still heard its crack on wood. They were remanded to a state juvenile corrections facility. Brian couldn’t even meet his mother’s eyes that day, knowing that he was just another disappointment to her.  
  
Six months in juvie and being way too pretty for his own good taught him more lessons than a year of school or time on the streets could. Rome was there, but not for all of it. Brian learned how to be smarter. Being caught one time wandering between the bathroom and the hallway had been enough. He hadn’t expected Rome to hear him or save him. Generally, he could always give as good as he got, but the odds were sorely against him that night. Brian never forgot that night nor did Rome forgive himself for not being Superman. It wasn’t until years later that he came to realize this.  
  
Brian’s release was early and almost entirely contingent upon the negligence of the corrections officers at the facility. Just one look at him that first visiting day after and his mother knew, as did Mrs. Pearce, who shared her son’s outrage and raised holy hell and threatened to sue until Brian was released shortly thereafter. Rome followed suit a few months later, because his fists had a hard time staying to themselves.  
  
At seventeen, he felt far older and possessed the constant restlessness of a caged tiger. He walked a tight line with none too many suspensions to hold him up. On one hand, he could count three, but when he really thought about it, there was only one person he could depend on. Mrs. Pearce finally put the tough love into second gear and sent Rome to live with some relatives in California for the rest of the year. She was determined that he would graduate. She constantly encouraged Brian to do the same. He understood why she did it, but having Rome leave hurt worse than a knife to the gut.  
  
Along the way, he’d experience several.  
  
Somehow, his listlessness turned his life down the path he would remain on for several more years to come. An argument began with his mother, because she was tired and he wasn’t being very helpful, she’d asked him to do a few simple things. He’d done half. She was pissed at him for being too into cars rather than his education.  
  
There was yelling and screaming and one of them yelled something about disappointments and how Brian’s father would be turning over in his grave. Angry and hurt, this was the explosion that brought all their walls down, and it was amazing that their tiny little house was still standing. His mother was breaking down in front of him, and he was just letting her.  
  
He had to get away. He was out the door and on the streets, ignoring her voice as she yelled for him to stay. He just walked that night, up and down the blocks, for how many hours he wasn’t quite sure. The sidewalks were polka-dotted with yellow-orange spotlights. He never stayed under one too long, instead merging in and out of the darkness as the night wore on. Just him with his battered and trusted blue windbreaker, old Chili Peppers tee, jeans that over last few weeks had become increasing tight, barely long enough for his reed-like legs, and Chucks that knew more about the city than he did.  
  
Then, he stopped, leaned against the billboard suspended on a rusted chain link fence. With half an arc of light cast upon him, he had visions of James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause swimming in his head. One wasn’t born with cool like that, rather it came with time. So Brian decided to wait.  
  
When the first car pulled up, he initially ignored the guy. Seriously, because who the hell asked for directions in a Cadillac while flashing their fancy watch about. When the guy held up a few bills, Brian looked him in the eye and began to offer directions, when he leaned closer and looked just a bit down, low enough to see the obvious tent in between the man’s legs, he realized just what the man was looking for and had to decide then and there how exactly he would help or if he would simply walk away.  
  
The sound of his mother’s sob answered for him.  
  
Brian got into the car and they went a few blocks away. He didn’t do much that night, but earned fifty bucks nonetheless. He wasn’t a complete virgin. It was a tactile combination of Rome and juvie that took much of his virginity through force rather than experimentation. He wasn't at all damaged, just used.  
  
Brian could read people better than most. This guy—with his big gut and semi-sweaty brow, seemed overly eager and the gleam in his eye was a true look of hope. He could make this simply business.  
  
It was like being behind the wheel of any car. He was in control, the driver, and wherever he decided they’d go, they would. So, Mr. Cadillac with the fancy watch got a handjob that night and he was damned grateful.  
  
When Brian returned the next morning, his hand was far more experienced than the rest of him. His pocket was rather full, and the fear of what he’d done hadn’t quite sunken in until he opened the front door to find his mother still sitting at the dining room table waiting for him.  
  
Her eyes were red and swollen. She looked so miserable. He closed the door and went over to her, kneeling in front of her chair. She took his face in her hands, stared into his eyes, because they were exactly like her own, then she slapped the hell out him and clutched him to her chest. Brian understood why she did it. He’d scared her to death. He promised he wouldn’t scare her like that again. He hugged her back tightly and planned to put the bulk of the money he made that night into her purse.  
  
Curiosity got the better of him of course. A few nights later he was back to walking the same strip as a few days prior. Mr. Cadillac came back along with Mr. Rusted Camry. His hand did all the work except for the one time his mouth did it for him, that trick was worth one hundred bucks alone and few dollars extra.  
  
So, that was how it went. A few nights a week, he snuck out and went to work. Only with the guys he knew. After an incident that left him with a shiner and a busted lip, because the customer wanted more than he was willing to give, Brian became more selective and only went to the guys he knew from the start or by referral.  
  
Before the bruiser incident, Rome came back. He too had that wild look in his eyes and the only stoop Brian would ever see in his shoulders. Rome never apologized with words; it was through action more or less.  
  
He caught on real quick as to where Brian was going, but not necessarily what he was doing. In the nick of time too. Rome watched his back after the shiner incident. His best friend hadn’t been that enraged or disgusted that Brian was actually hustling. Rome figured everyone in life had a hustle, why should Brian be any different. At least, Brian wouldn’t end up owing anyone in the process, especially with Rome watching his back. So far, it was all going well. It couldn’t hurt to have someone watching his back in case things went south again.  
  
They were constant partners.  
  
There was business and everything else. Feelings were reserved for the hours of daylight and they both understood this equally.  
  
The last bit of Brian’s virginity didn’t go to Rome, despite how close the two were. Mr. Camry began to cry during the middle of his handjob, which totally threw Brian off his game. He didn’t really want to pry, but having a trick cry was so off-putting. Apparently, things were just going bad for Mr. Rusted Camry—work, his social life, his family. He wasn’t married—thank God. Brian just felt bad for the guy.  
  
Everyone had shitty times. What spurred him to kiss Mr. Rusted Camry was initially the desire to get him to shut up, which he did. He didn’t normally do charity, but the sniffling and red puffy eyes were too much for him. Mr. Camry caught on a few seconds after Brian’s mouth was sealed over his, made up for his delay with enthusiasm. Turned out Mr. Camry was a pretty good kisser. Then, Brian just asked, “Do you want to fuck me?” That last part of his virginity had to go sooner or later, why not with someone he knew moderately well, better someone he could trust.  
  
The thing went off well. It was far more satisfying for Mr. Camry, who probably hadn’t been laid in months. It wasn’t all that great for Brian, because it hurt a bit—well, a lot. Mr. Camry was happy and he couldn’t stop touching and kissing Brian, thanking him constantly. Brian didn’t feel dirty after that one, more like a humanitarian actually.  
  
It was every time after that involved the man he met the next night that made it feel dirty. He’d pushed Rome back into the darkness and waited for the man’s signal to come closer. When he leaned into the window, it was like his world was shattering all over again. Uncle Tim was staring back at him with money clutched in hand. This wasn’t even a sting, because Uncle Tim’s smile dropped as soon as he realized just who he was soliciting.  
  
There was a brief moment where he wondered whether he should just turn and walk away; the damage was done, he might as well see it through or maybe Uncle Tim would be the one to turn away.  
  
That didn’t happen.  
  
For a time, from nineteen to twenty one, Uncle Tim was the only man Brian was fucking. His ‘Uncle’ was surprisingly possessive when it came to that transaction of services; everything else he didn’t really mind. Neither said a word to Brian’s mother. Even though Rome was just dying to.  
  
It was just so easy for him to be like a doll, big and lifeless, when he was with Uncle Tim. There was no kissing. Brian just …couldn’t do that. Not with the man who’d come to replace his father, because that would make the whole situation far more fucked up than it actually was.  
  
But he kept doing it. Why? Because his dreams of becoming a racer seemed to be getting farther and farther out of reach. He had a car, but it was taking forever to fix it up. Above all else, his mother was happy. Happy that he’d straightened up and had a ‘job,’ though she didn’t know what it was. The money in her purse made things better and just the little things he managed to do for her made her smile. That was all he wanted.  
  
Perseverance was one of his big attributes. Almost as important as his blond curls and glacial blue eyes. Uncle Tim laughed at him sometimes, mostly his dreams, which were really unsettling. Yeah, Uncle Tim—Tim thought his chances of being a racer were just as shot to hell as him becoming a cop like his dad. Tim chuckled to himself and stroked Brian’s hair like he was a giant cat. Brian thought about stones cold and still and refused to shiver in disgust.  
  
Brian could have disagreed with him. He knew this wouldn’t last forever.  
  
A few months later, Rome was pinched in a chop-shop sting. Brian was a little wary about going out without him. Especially when one creepy guy just seemed to watch him every night he walked his beat. Yeah, he was weirded out; especially when a guy he knew who walked the same street went with him didn’t come back the next morning.  
  
That settled the issue of retirement for Brian. He bid farewell to Mr. Cadillac and Mr. Rusted Camry, because they were the only two he had since the beginning, and grabbed a newspaper intent on using the Wanted section to get a real job. Mr. Cadillac had actually offered to make him a kept man. The offer…was well…sweet, but it was more than time for Brian to find something safer and more efficient for work.  
  
He could still be a racer, if he got his life together. He was lulled to sleep every night to the imagined sound of high performance engines he built from the ground up. The purred song. The vibration rising up from the bucket seats. He’d keep his dream for himself and Rome.  
  
Rome hated being locked up more than anything. The only thing that made the other times bearable when they were kids was the fact that it was both of them in the clink together. Now, it was just Rome and four cement walls and a bunch of assholes who weren’t his best friend. Rome could take care of himself. He had to with a mouth like his. But, it was always better to have someone watching one’s back.  
  
Four years after wandering the streets at seventeen, he was spending his first night in retirement, rather than studying for a class or partying with friends at some club, he was home. He felt old, but not used up.  
  
That night was the first time in a few years when he hadn’t walked his beat. He felt twitchy and strange. His mother was happy though; glad to spend some time with him. She had big news to share. Really good news apparently from the way she swept up her increasingly gray streaked hair into a bun and rattled around in the kitchen. He could smile too, just by seeing her so effervescent.  
  
When Uncle Tim appeared at their front door and his mother threw her arms around him, Brian knew there would be nothing good about the news she had to share. When she kissed his cheek, he wanted to vomit.  
  
They had dinner. Somewhere in between the start of dessert and them leaving to attend a play at the community center, his mother announced that Uncle Tim had asked her to marry him and she had said, “Yes.”  
  
He was sick then and there. His father’s best friend, his partner…Jesus. After he finished retching, he said congratulations and told his mother he wasn’t feeling well. He couldn’t look Tim in the eye. Or, maybe, it was Tim who couldn’t look him in the eye.  
  
Brian agonized for hours wondering what the hell could he do. There was never a good way to tell one’s mother that one had been sleeping with her fiancé for a couple of years.  
  
What did he do?  
  
He told Tim discreetly to be careful with his mother and threatened him without raising the ire of the man’s natural cop instincts. Then, he left a letter and nice sum of money for his mother, promising that he would be okay and reiterating that it was time for him to make his own way; there was also a mention of the fact that he knew Tim had cheated on her long before she told him that they were engaged.  
  
He was gone the next morning in his Nissan Skyline that was more than decent, but not quite race ready. L.A. would hopefully be the site of his rebirth. He hoped there was enough light in the City of Angels to hide the ugly scars of his youth or he’d just fake it until he’d made it. Either way, he was headed for a new start.  


* * *

  
L.A. was too expensive, which led him to staying in Barstow for a while. He got to surf, work a few odds and ends jobs, and put a little time and money into his car. Eventually, he got to L.A. and promised Rome a place for him when he got out.  
  
He drove all over the place taking in the view. From Santa Monica Blvd. to Rodeo Drive, he immersed himself in the sights and sounds of his new home. Stood beneath the Hollywood sign and stared down at a city of lights and decided to throw himself headlong into a new life. It turned out almost as bad as Arizona in the end. No, there weren’t horrific soap opera entanglements. He did get picked up one night, of all things being too slow when he was checking out a race.  
  
Of course, one of the cops that tagged him had been someone he conducted business with before. He’d tried to keep his head down and pretend to not know the guy. It was the cop that offered to get him out in exchange for a favor or two down the line. Brian tried to stick with his M.O. of keeping his head down, but the cop didn’t take kindly to being rejected and let it spread throughout the holding cell that Brian was a pro picked up at the race for servicing one of their racing’ brethren.  
  
Yeah, that was a long night of moving fast, keeping his back against the wall, and his eyes open. He got the hell out of Los Angeles the next morning. Brian went said a goodbye to a friend or two he’d picked up in the city, said goodbye to one in particular that had a Supra and a mantra that Brian couldn’t shake. The guy’s sister was gorgeous, but the guy himself was more like gravity and Brian couldn’t escape his pull. Maybe, in another life he could have been part of the team, might have driven off into the sunset in the Supra, but instead, he told Dom he’d still owe him a ten second car and wished him luck at Race Wars.  
  
Brian ignored the scenic atmosphere and hit I-10 and said ‘fuck the West Coast’, then drove the Skyline clear across the country until he reached another ocean.  
  
New York was his next shot. For the sake of his ribs and his sanity, Brian O’Connor needed the Big Apple to be different. He had a feeling that it would be.  


* * *

  
Brian didn’t sleep well in silence. Never had, never would. In California, it had been the sound of the ocean that lulled him asleep. New York offered the steady stream of cars weaving through the streets and the sound of voices and footsteps along the never-ending lines of pavement.  
  
Sleep so far was hard to come by in Boston. He couldn’t blame Taylor for it. The pain medicine they got from one of Taylor’s former bodegas put the other man under harder than a blow to the head coupled by the maximum legal dosage of an anesthesiologist’s best drugs. Most people wanted silence, but Brian couldn’t handle the buzz of near nothing. Despite the heat radiating off Taylor’s body and the low rumbling purred snores emitted steadily and their increasingly consecutive and firmly exclusive nights together, Brian couldn’t grab a hold of sleep no matter how hard he tried.  
  
Sometimes, Taylor stayed awake with him. Brian could better feel the weight of those chocolate dark eyes on him when he couldn't see them. Every time Taylor muttered, “What’s wrong?” in the midst of being half-asleep, Brian got one of those warm and tingly feelings. Yeah, even though whores were supposed to be either tortured or eternally nonchalant, he could still feel that what he had was still a good thing.  
  
Brian was a student of knowing people. He couldn’t have lasted as long as he had if he wasn’t. People automatically assumed that Taylor, a guy of his build with a hard-edged stare, clenched jaw, and no bullshit mentality was a predator. They were right. Brian had similar skills; most clients hadn’t wanted those traits as part of the deal, but here in the dark especially, he could stalk through the sheets and pin Taylor, without hitting his shoulder, and render him breathless and loose limbed.  
  
That was when Brian felt his power and Taylor wore a lazy smile that glowed in the darkness.  
  
With blood rushing through his ears, Brian would reply in a yawn, “Absolutely nothing.” He could sleep then. Taylor would never tell him, but he always slept better, too.


End file.
